Many types of bookends are used to support a row of books on a shelf, desk or similar surface. A commonly employed device features a horizontal plate that sits on the top of the shelf and slides under one end of the row of books. A second vertical plate extends upwardly from the horizontal plate to engage the book at the end of the row. This apparatus is typically quite unstable. It tends to wobble and tip, particularly when supporting a row of heavy or oversized books. Moreover, such bookends tend to slide around on the bookshelf. This can scratch or otherwise damage the shelf and the books.
Various bookends have been developed that attach to, or otherwise positively engage the bookshelf. Again, however, these devices usually provide relatively unstable support. Conventional bookends, such as are disclosed by Cooke, U.S. Pat. No. 4,327,838 and Knudsen, Danish Patent No. 70,528, are constructed so that when mounted to the bookshelf they are disposed generally in a single vertical plane beside the row of books. As a result, these bookends tend to wobble or twist on the shelf under the load of a row of books. They are also limited as to the thickness of the shelf they can accommodate. To remedy this problem, certain systems employ elaborate bookend clamps and specially constructed shelves. However, such products are often bulky, unwieldy and unattractive. Moreover, typically, they cannot be conveniently adapted to a standard bookshelf. These intricate bookends also tend to require fairly complex and expensive manufacturing techniques.